Rain Tuesday could not keep staff at the University of Vermont from heading to the polls to vote on whether to unionize. Nearly 800 UVM employees including clerical and administrative workers are casting ballots on whether to form a collective bargaining unit, and if so, which union to affiliate with. "It's going to give us a level playing field, so that when decisions start to be made on budgets, [the administration] won't say, 'Staff is not unionized, so we'll start cutting them.'"

The question on the Burlington campus comes as a series of labor issues is making national headlines. In Chicago, teachers left their classrooms at odds with the city over the length of the school day and other working conditions. The National Football League locked out referees as the two sides clash over pay and pensions. And the National Hockey League's season, set to start in October, could be frozen because players and the league are facing off over how to split revenues.

UVM labor economist Elaine McCrate, who's part of a faculty union on campus, says the age-old perception that managers are better off than the rank-and-file is a big part of what's fueling the headline-grabbing labor impasses. "What a union does is it puts the power of numbers behind the kinds of demands a lot of people want to make," McCrate explained. "Usually in order for one side to get something, they also have to give up something; that's what a negotiation is."

"The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer," Patenaude said, describing what she sees as a growing divide between campus administrators and staff.

Patenaude noted that if the University of Vermont staff does end up forming a union, joining will not be mandatory. The voting continues until Wednesday evening.